Tony Abbott admits being rude but not intimidatory in his dealings with a former student election rival at university in the 1970s. Picture: Gary Ramage Source: The Australian

TONY Abbott is hardly in a position to complain that his behaviour at university 35 years ago is being scrutinised now as people make judgments about his fitness to be prime minister.

He virtually invited that scrutiny himself, in a speech a couple of months ago.

"I am not asking the Australian people to take me on trust, but on the record of a lifetime," the Opposition Leader said.

"As student president, trainee priest, Rhodes Scholar, surf life saver and volunteer firefighter, as well as a member of parliament and as a minister in a government."

Note that Abbott specifically mentioned student politics and the position of Student Representative Council president at Sydney University.

Allegations that he used intimidatory tactics in his pursuit of that office have come back to haunt him, and his clumsy response has made the situation worse.

Yesterday, after virtually hiding from the media since the matter erupted a week ago, he finally came to his senses and met the issue head-on in a tough television interview on Nine's Today show, and later at a news conference.

It was what he should have done right at the start.

Abbott repeated the mistake Julia Gillard made over allegations concerning an incident in her pre-politics days when she was a lawyer - letting the controversy drag on rather than dealing with it quickly.

When Gillard eventually called a news conference and promised to stay until journalists had exhausted all their questions, the fuss died away. Abbott will be hoping for a similar result. He has made things harder for himself than they needed to be, however.

He now flatly denies the central allegation - that, after rival student politician Barbara Ramjan beat him in an election for the SRC presidency in 1977, he punched the wall on either side of her head.

"It never happened," Abbott said repeatedly yesterday.

But he made no such categorical denial in his initial response to journalist David Marr, who reported the Ramjan claim in a Quarterly Essay profile on Abbott.

Abbott simply told Marr he had no recollection of the incident, adding: "It would have been profoundly out of character had it occurred."

Why did Abbott's memory improve in the space of a week? A cynic might suggest that minders, recognising that this is very dangerous ground for him, insisted on it.

Abbott's aggressive style worries many voters. And it is claimed he has a particular problem with women.

The alleged intimidation of Ramjan combined both areas of vulnerability. Abbott could not afford to leave any doubt. He had to try to kill the issue off.

Deciding the truth or otherwise of the allegation comes down in the end to who you believe. It is Ramjan's word against Abbott's.

Abbott argues that, if the incident really occurred, Ramjan would not have waited this long to talk about it.

But Sydney barrister David Patch, also prominent in student politics back then, says a "very shaken, scared and angry" Ramjan told him about Abbott's behaviour at the time.

Abbott and his supporters simply say that what Patch says should be ignored because he was once an ALP candidate.

Another alleged witness is ridiculed and pronounced irrelevant because he does not want his name made public.

Cartoonist Lindsay Foyle has disputed the claim that violence would not have been in the young Abbott's character, telling a story about the future Liberal leader wanting to knock his block off in an argument over contraception. But Abbott says that didn't happen either.

A lot of people are making stuff up if you believe the Abbott camp.

Abbott himself claims a Labor Party dirt unit is behind the whole thing.

That angered the publisher and the editor of the respected Quarterly Essay, who said it was "completely implausible" that an author and journalist of Marr's standing would be connected with a "dirt unit".

Journalist Greg Sheridan, Abbott's best friend and staunch political ally in their university days, put forward another explanation for the emergence of the allegation.

"This is the most disgraceful sectarian anti-Catholic campaign I've ever seen," he said yesterday.

"It comes down to anti-Catholic sectarianism on behalf of the ABC and David Marr."

Wow! Quite a conspiracy if that's right. At this point it all starts to feel just a bit weird, don't you think?

Abbott made one admission yesterday, though, that his critics will regard as having relevance to today's politics.

As a female SRC president, Ramjan asked to be called "chairperson" rather than "chairman - but Abbott confirmed that he referred to her instead as "chairthing".

He concedes he is not proud of this, calling it "silly, childish, embarrassing". But many will see it as more than that.

Patch, for one, has argued that it displays a gender-based lack of respect "similar to the disrespectful way that Abbott treats the Prime Minister and her office today".

Laurie Oakes is political editor for the Nine Network. His column appears every Saturday in The Daily Telegraph.

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